


5 Times They Made Questionable Parenting Moves and the 1 Time They Definitely Didn't

by Kaiyoz



Series: ...And James Makes Three [7]
Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: 5 Times, Accidents, Gender Neutrality or sexism you decide, M/M, NonSerious Child Injuries, Some people will disagree with my parenting choices, Upset Children, get over it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-30
Updated: 2014-05-31
Packaged: 2018-01-27 03:01:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 3,963
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1712540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kaiyoz/pseuds/Kaiyoz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve and Tony parent their child in some unique ways.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Bonding

**Author's Note:**

> This story was written in under 24 hours while I was at Disneyland... so in actuality it was probably written in about 4 hours. Sorry for all the errors. :)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> James is unhappy and Phil and Tony bond in an unusual way. Taken from an episode of Reba.

Another cry rent the air as young James Stark-Rogers, seven months old, screamed, ending in a pitiful sob. 

Tony sat outside the door, listening to the noise his son made. His head was tipped back and staring at the ceiling as a tumbler of scotch dangled from his fingertips. 

Steve had given up long ago sitting outside the door, instead running down to the gym to run off the stress. 

“When he’s freshly-diapered, fed, uninjured, and healthy, Mr. Stark, there’s nothing else you can do for him. Maybe it’s time to let him cry it out,” his pediatrician had suggested. 

James had been constantly crying when he was put to bed for the past few weeks and they had taken him in for a visit with his doctor. The doctor confirmed he was fine and had suggested they learn to let James ‘cry it out’ but Tony was beyond uncomfortable with the idea. 

Steve had convinced him to give it a try, "just for a few days", he had said. But those few days were turning into an unbearable task. 

He had spent the past “few days” in the hallway outside his child’s room, listening to him cry. Sometimes he only cried for five minutes; sometimes it was thirty. Right now he was edging into thirty. He knew it was needless. He knew Jarvis could alert them in case of an emergency. He KNEW James was healthy, safe, uninjured, fed and had a clean diaper. But something felt wrong. It was wrong to let his boy cry. To scream. When all he wanted was his daddies to hold him for a few more minutes. 

He could afford to give his kid anything in the world and he wouldn’t hold him for a few minutes? Was this really any different than what his father had done to him? Sure. The intent wasn’t the same but the results were. 

Howard and Maria had done it to toughen their boy up. Tony and Steve were doing it to teach him to self soothe. It was the same, if looked at from a distance. 

He heard the ding of the elevator and prepared himself to convince Steve he was fine to sit here a while longer. 

His eyebrows rose when he saw Coulson striding down the hall.

“Stark, how is it?” 

“Tiring,” Tony muttered, taking a pull from his tumbler. 

“Thirty two minutes of tiring by Jarvis’ count…” Coulson plopped himself down across from Tony, gesturing for the bottle and Steve’s empty tumbler. 

Tony let out a pathetic chuckle. “Only that long?” 

Coulson nodded sagely. They drank in silence for a few minutes, James’ cries background noise. 

“Why are you doing this to yourself?” Coulson asked suddenly.

The genius let out a huff. “Because this whole thing feels wrong, it’s… it’s ineffable. He needs me. I should be there. I shouldn’t be letting him cry.”

Coulson nodded. “And you told Steve all this?”

“Yeah. He agrees. That’s why he can’t sit here. But it’s… it’s what good parents do. Studies show few difference in children who sleep-soothe versus those that don’t. He needs to know how to help himself sleep.”

“But?”

Tony sighed, finishing the glass of scotch before answering. “But it feels wrong. Just wrong.”

Coulson nodded sympathetically before sitting up and making eye contact with Tony. “Then go pick him up.”

Tony shook his head. “I can’t.” 

“Tony,” he said, using the inventor’s first name for the first time in the conversation. “I’ve known you for a long time, longer than anyone else in this building. And if there’s one thing YOU should always do, it’s trust your instincts. It doesn’t matter what Steve, myself, the doctor, or anyone else thinks. If a parenting move just feels wrong. Don’t do it. He’s your child. He’s Steve’s too but he is yours and sometimes you’re going to have to make a call that Steve’s not going to like. And if it feels this wrong… don’t do it. Steve will understand… and fuck what everyone else thinks.”

“Woah. You cursed,” Tony said around a pitiful laugh. 

Coulson shrugged. “I feel passionately about this. So what do you want to do?”

“I want to go pick up my son.”

Phil patted his shoulder, “Then that’s what you should do.”

Tony was up and off the floor a second later, the door slid open almost before he could reach it and James’ cries quieted.


	2. Barbie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> James wants things, his parents don't

“Are you sure you wouldn’t rather have a soldier?” Steve asked, Tony nodding behind him.

“No. That one.”

“What about this…” Tony started.

“NO! That one!” James argued.

They were arguing with a two year old. Their reputations were officially shot.

Steve looked the doll over. “Is it the dog?” he asked.

“We can get a toy dog, if you want that?” Tony offered his son.

“No,” James grumbled. “That one.”

"I cannot believe this is a real Barbie and that this is the one he wants. I'm disgusted," Steve started, frowning at the accessories.

Clint came up behind them, a double scoop of ice cream in his hand.

“He wants the freaking Barbie. Get him the freaking Barbie,” the archer grumbled.

Steve frowned. “But it’s a girl’s toy,” he argued.

Clint frowned. “Says who?”

“Says the giant sign over our head that says “GIRLS”,” Tony argued.

“That’s gender stereotyping. You’re a sexist!” Clint accused sarcastically. “Are you worried about him being picked on? He’s the smartest two year old in the area and possibly the richest. Not many will mess with that. Are you worried he’ll turn gay? ‘Cause you all had so many Barbies growing up? Are you worried he’ll start wearing dresses? I think his female role models show him that you can be “pretty” and freakishly tough as a woman. He wants the doll. Buy him the fucking doll. What exactly are your concerns here? Because I don’t think Barbie is going to give him a false body image.”

“You know…” Tony began. “The caveman has a point.”

Steve, a bit chagrined now, looked at the doll James was pointing at behind them. He pulled the Barbie off the shelf and handed it to him. It would go with his baby doll just fine.

James laughed delightedly, hugging the toy close. “T’ank you, Poppa. I wanted her.”

The headlines would later read that James owned a Barbie bought from FAO Schwartz for $16.99 called [Taffy Nikki Fashion Doll and Pet Playset](http://www.target.com/p/barbie-potty-training-taffy-nikki-fashion-doll-and-pet-playset/-/A-14771228#prodSlot=medium_1_39&term=barbie). It would sell out in four hours once that hit the news.

  
It was pointed out that his fathers, Iron Man and Captain America, had bought it for him. Some called it a win for gender-neutrality. Some called it an affront to feminism. Some claimed it was weird. Everyone wanted to know what Black Widow thought of James’ Barbie.

They stopped asking when she threw a microphone, and the reporter it was attached to, into a fountain.

Tony and Steve called it a win for New York, as James’ half naked Barbie held off King Kong from destroying James’ Lego New York skyline.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's a real Barbie. I was stunned. It was TOO good not to run with.


	3. Bought

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony buys a bad choice

“But he wanted one!” Tony argued. 

“This week ALONE he also wanted: Mjolnir, an exploding arrow, your scotch, a steak knife, and a diamond encrusted Malibu Barbie Car!”

Tony’s eyes flashed, his finger pointing straight at Steve’s face, “He NEEDED a car for his Barbie and her aliens! It was reasonable!”

“This,” Steve said, waving his arms at the terrace, “This is NOT reasonable!”

“I will donate her back to the petting zoo when he’s done. I’ve had some forethought about this.” Tony smiled over at the little boy out in the garden.

Steve sat down hard, his head in his hands. He was trying to ignore the sounds of James’ laughter. “No Tony, no matter what you say, there was no forethought to this.”

“Fine! You have to tell him we’re taking her back then! Break his little heart. This, right here, is a poor decision,” Tony answered.

James’ squealed louder in the distance, Clint’s arms keeping him on top of the animal as the former circus performer guided the animal around the garden deck. 

“Poor decision? Poor decision?!” Steve gaped, his eyes nearly popping from his head. “YOU bought a two year old a LLAMA!” Steve growled. 

“He… wanted one?” Tony tried one more time, weakly. 

The black and white animal trotted by the window quietly even as Steve sighed.


	4. Bugging

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes James bugs his Poppa for the right reasons.
> 
> (Steve's an unintentional bad dad in this one.)

Steve grabbed his shield up one more time, forcing it to ricochet around the room. He had missed and now Clint was paying the price. The archer’s broken leg was testament to his poor timing. Clint had relied on him for backup and he had missed the shot to save the archer.

He had been at this for two hours without cease, his arms ached just a bit but he took it as the price of practice. He wasn’t going to miss again. 

James had been patient, waiting in the secure practice room they had so that the Avengers could watch James but keep him safe from any flying shields, arrows, hammers, or people. James called it the “Jam-aquarium” and Tony had outfitted it with a blue carpet and painted sea creatures and kelp on the wall. There was also a tiny play castle. 

He had been coloring or playing with his phone for the past hour quietly. 

“Poppa,” James finally interrupted. 

“One minute, bug,” Steve answered, trying to make a nearly impossible shot, decapitating three holograms with the same throw. 

James was quiet another two minutes, “Poppa, I…”

“I know, bug, one second,” Steve answered his nearly three year old absently. 

James stomped twice, wriggling. 

“No fits,” Steve said sternly. “You won’t be going out with Auntie Tasha, if you throw a fit.”

“Poppa, I need…”

Steve caught the shield one handed. “No more, bug.”

James crouched, wriggling more but not making a sound. 

Jarvis’ dry tone broke Steve’s concentration. “Captain Rogers, I suggest that you…”

“Mute,” Steve grumbled. “I don’t need to be told to stop practicing. I’m not Tony.”

Steve smelled James’ problem before Jarvis overrode his mute. “Sir, Master James needs your assistance.”

“Oh, damn. I’m sorry, James,” Steve said jogging over and opening the Jam-aquarium. James burst from the room, running towards the bathroom, his socks leaving small puddles behind him.

Steve told Jarvis to send some cleaning bots to clean the carpet before heading to the bathroom. 

“James? I’m coming in.” 

“No!” James yelled back. Steve felt some slight resistance but still managed to push the door open with a finger. James was trying to hold the door shut.

“You can’t come in!” James screamed, crying. 

“I just want to check on you,” Steve answered calmly. “I’m sorry, bug. This is my fault.” 

“I had an accident!” James cried, his face beyond upset, as he yanked fruitlessly at his jeans. They weren’t coming down, especially now that they were wet. 

“I know; it’s my fault.”

James shook his head angrily, plopping down on the little stool. “I can’t go with Uncle Bruce now, he said I could come do science if I didn’t have an accident for a week.”

Steve reached out one hand and pulled his wet socks off of his feet. “I’ll tell him it’s my fault. He will still take you.”

“No, he won’t!” James cried again. “He said he won’! Now I can’t go!”

“We will ask him right now, I promise he will let you,” Steve answered, trying to calm his frantic son.

“Dr. Banner is currently out of the building,” Jarvis answered Steve’s unasked question.

James cried louder. 

“Can you tell him to come find us when he returns?”

Steve helped him get the wet clothes off and ran the crying little boy through the shower before wrapping him in a towel and taking him upstairs. 

Nothing was going to stop this now. James was like Tony in this sense. Once he got an idea nothing and no one was going to stop him and he was passionate about those ideas. When you combined passion and determination in Tony, you got Iron Man and arc reactors and the thousands of things produced for the Avengers and Stark Industries. When you combined passion and determination in James, you got either an amazing result or tears and frustration because of his inability to complete his idea. 

Upstairs, he put James in fresh clothes, trying to comfort him with his Hulk pants. 

“He’s not going to let me go,” James wailed, whimpering pitifully. 

Steve turned on his favorite TV show, the Gummibears, and tried to soothe the little boy. “He’ll let you go,” he murmured into his boy’s fluffy black hair. 

Over an hour later Bruce came into the living room, a bag of books in one hand and smoothies from his favorite juice bar in the other. 

“What did you do to my nephew?” Bruce asked without prompting. “Jarvis can text me, you realize.”

“I’m sorry!” James cried, his arms stretched for Bruce. 

Bruce handed him a small smoothie, glaring at Steve. “It wasn’t your fault, James.”

Bruce continued, ignoring Steve. “You did so well. You gave your Poppa plenty of notice. You knew you had to go and tried to tell him. If you don’t have an accident the rest of today, you are ready for a science treat.”

James stopped crying slowly. “Really?”

“Of course,” Bruce nodded. “Now, your Poppa is going to say sorry and you’re going to say, it’s okay.”

Steve came over and kissed James’ head. “I’m sorry, bug. When it’s an emergency like that, just keep talking.”

“It’s okay, Poppa.”

Bruce continued, “Now you are going to apologize for crying for an hour when you could’ve just had Jarvis call me.”

“Sorry, Poppa,” James murmured, kissing his father’s big knuckle. 

“It’s okay, baby.”


	5. Bloody

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes parenting is a little bloody.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: There is a bit of accidental injury in this one. It's not really graphic but is unpleasant to imagine on a child.

James clambered up the step behind his daddy waiting patiently as the man set down his cup of coffee before trying to climb into his lap. 

“Daddy, up?!” James asked, giving up on hoisting himself onto the bench. 

“No, you can get it,” Tony answered, gesturing at him to climb. 

With renewed determination, James threw a leg up onto the bench and used the tips of his finger on the back of the bench to start to pull himself up. He was pulling hard when he lost his grip. 

Everything else seemed to happen in slow motion. Tony watched as the little fingers lost their grip and he couldn’t manage to grip onto the tile-covered bench. His jaw smacked into the bench first with an audible click. His other leg was off the ground, which sent him backwards immediately, his head hitting first on the concrete before he rolled off the step and onto the sharp gravel. His cheek was pushed into the rock and his hands braced on the ground. 

The crying seemed to start almost as soon as he touched the ground. 

Blood came out of his mouth in a thin stream. Blood off of his scraped hands seemed to dot the ground. 

“Oh, shit!” Tony hollered, he picked James up and pulled him close, he turned to run back into the house. 

James was crying loudly now. Howling “Daddy” in a high and long tone.

“I’m so sorry, baby, shhhh… don’t cry. Don’t cry. You’ll be okay. Shhh… I’m going to get you cleaned up. Sorry, baby. Sorry.”

He set the little boy on the bathroom counter. “Your Daddy is going to get you all cleaned up, let me see in your mouth.”

Tony kept up the quiet murmurings, trying to be calm in the midst of his screaming and bleeding child. “You bit your tongue, you’ll be fine… Poppa bites his tongue all the time. Jarvis what do you do for a bitten tongue?” 

Bruce came in a minute later. “Jarvis called me, is he okay?”

“I don’t know, there’s blood everywhere… he’s screaming… I don’t know where it’s all coming from.”

James let out a particularly high-pitched scream then. 

Bruce sighed, “Get him calmed down, I’ll be back with the first aid kit.”

“Okay, okay. J-baby, look at me.” He took James’ face in his hands and held him steady, trying to stare deeply into the boy’s eyes. 

“I need you take a deep breath. Another one. Another one, slower. Slower. Another one. Okay. Spit out the blood. Another deep breath. I know it hurts. But you can be brave for me, right?”

James nodded, raggedly. “Daddy, my tongue hurts.”

“I know, J-baby. You are being so brave.”

The boy held up his hands, “They’re bleeding… And my head hurts lots.”

James was a fairly rough and tumble kid so scrapes were nothing new but they had combined to create a perfect storm.

Bruce came back in then. “Have him rinse his mouth with water a few times to get his mouth cleared of the blood. Clint is bringing a Popsicle for him. I’m just going to wrap up his scrapes.”

He quickly wiped down the boy’s knees and palms, to clear out the debris and after a quick inspection wrapped them with a bit of gauze and tape. 

Bruce ran a cursory hand up his back and neck and then the back of his head. 

“OW!” screeched the little boy, shying from Bruce’s palm. 

“Did you hit your head?”

“Yeah, I bonked it on the floor,” James confirmed. 

Tony looked at the back of the boy’s head, gently feeling the bump. “Should we get him a scan?”

Bruce looked in James’ eyes before shaking his head. “Just have Jarvis run a quick scan and he’ll be fine. How did this even happen?”

“He fell off the bench when he tried to climb on it,” Tony answered, stripping his bloodied shirt off.

“James, your daddies told you not to climb things…”

“Daddy told me I could do it,” James answered. “I just got to get a little bigger.”

Bruce whipped around to stare at Tony, “You told him to climb on something when Steve has expressly forbidden him from climbing on anything taller than him?” 

Tony frowned and nodded. 

The other man let out a dark laugh. “Steve is going to rip into you like Thor on a box of cinnamon Pop Tarts. I’d tell him now so that he has some time to cool down before he gets back from the store.”

When Steve got a text message a few minutes later. James was laid on the couch surrounded by cushions, his head pillowed on an ice pack, his Popsicle in his mouth, and bandages on his hands and knees. 

“We had a little accident,” read Tony’s message. “I tried to have him climb onto the bench.”

Steve left the art shop at a run a minute later.


	6. Bellowing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> James is in a phase.

“Scream all you want!” Tony called, cranking up the AC/DC as James laid on the floor crying. 

James had decided to throw a tantrum in the middle of the art store, and his fathers had decided to pick him up and take him home. He had been moody most of the day but throwing his Starkphone and yelling at his parents had been the straw that broke the camel’s back. 

They had stopped the shopping trip and decided to take James home. The boy only screamed louder when he found out they were not actually going to the petting zoo like he had wanted to do all day. He hadn’t wanted to do any errands. He didn’t want to see the city planners. He hadn’t wanted to go wait for Daddy to sign papers at Stark Industries. And he definitely hadn’t wanted to go to the sandwich shop and grab art supplies. He had wanted the petting zoo and maybe frozen yogurt afterwards. 

“Were we being unreasonable with the errands?” Steve asked Tony.

“No, it was less than two hours, he had things to play with. He should be able to handle that at four.”

Steve nodded. “True. We told him what we were doing… And he should be able to handle it.”

Tony nodded back, “We did feed him right?”

“You did,” Clint answered, dropping out of the vent. “Scrambled eggs and frozen pancakes ala Bruce. Tantrum?”

“Yep,” Tony answered. “Decided he didn’t want to do any more errands. Threw his phone, yelled, and we left.”

Phil and Natasha came in a moment later, both of them raising an unimpressed eyebrow at the four and a half year old on the floor. “Tantrum?”

“Mmhmm,” Steve answered. “We’re waiting until he’s calm enough to have a timeout.”

The boy was quieting, looking over at his gathering family. Thor and Bruce came out of the kitchen after a few minutes; they ignored James as well.

“How long until this phase passes?” Tony whined, quietly enough that James couldn’t hear them. 

Phil laughed. “Until he realizes he isn’t going to get his way with this tactic, then he will think of a new one. Twenty bucks says he tries it two more tries before he gives up. It’s only been four days.”

James was almost completely quiet, just hiccuping now. The music had quieted as he had. 

“You threw a fit. Tossed your phone and yelled at us. You need to go sit on the timeout chair. Four minutes,” Tony said tonelessly.

“Poppa!” James started, turning to his other father.

“Go. Now,” Steve answered. 

The little boy’s eyes roamed over the rest of his family but no one appeared to pity him. He slunk off to the chair that was underneath the “ugly” painting as he called it. 

He waited the obligatory four minutes before slinking over to his parents, apologizing and hugging both of them. 

“I hope you’re sorry, especially since you don’t have a phone anymore.”

James looked confused. 

“We left it at the store, where you threw it,” Tony filled in. 

James looked as distraught as Tony if he were told his phone was gone. “You LEFT it? But it was mine!”

“Then you shouldn’t have thrown it… We’ll see if the store found it and kept it later but I think right now you should go pick up the toy box you kicked over on the way in here and then go ask Uncle Bruce if you can help with dinner,” Steve explained calmly.

“Yes, Poppa.”

The boy walked away quietly.

Tony looked over at Steve, “You have the phone?”

Steve smiled, “Totally.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some people will not agree with my style of dealing with tantrums but oh well. My mom recalls times where she had to just leave a store when we were being really bad. She was single (my dad was around but wouldn't watch us) and would take four of us to stores. Rather than interrupt the store she would just leave and really inconvenience herself. She only had to do it a few times before we understood the "If you don't behave we are going home to _____." If she gave us a warning she would ALWAYS do it.


	7. Barbie Outtake

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Natasha's reaction to the Barbie
> 
> (A reviewer* commented that they wanted to see Natasha's reaction to the Barbie and that set off a plot bunny.)
> 
> *I won't post their name without permission.

Natasha stared in horrified fascination as James happily showed her his new Barbie.

Clint was laughing delightedly from the kitchen counter, while Phil smothered laughter as he finished making a tuna sandwich.

“… And the dog poops!” James finished, pushing the dog’s tail, so that little brown chunks of plastic fell from the dog.

Natasha said nothing for a few moments.

“Aunty Tasa?” James asked, “Do you want to play?”

Clint pressed something into her hand and winked before climbing back onto the counter to dig deep into the Puff Cheetos.

She looked at the Barbie Clint had handed her. It was exactly what she would’ve picked, a [beautiful, brunette ballerina](http://www.tias.com/stores/phillipdpritchard/pictures/05doll101x1a.jpg). She was the start of Swan Lake.

She sat down across from James and smiled at the grinning little boy.

“I think they all need new outfits. She can’t get a single weapon into her outfit. Tutu’s are much more practical. You can hide all sorts of things in the tulle.”

James nodded, “I think we can buy new clothes for them.”

“So what’s her cover?” Natasha started.

The boy frowned for a second before his face lit up. “She’s a dog walker at day so she can go to ballerina school but that’s just her cover… she’s actually an operator for…”

“Operative,” Phil corrected.

“Yes, operative for SHIELD and is trying to bring down the…” James started to move his Barbie across the table. 


End file.
